The phone-hacking trial will be dream territory for the PM’s rivals

Under siege, Cameron will find it hard to resist the proposed state controls
on the media, says Peter Oborne

In 18 days’ time, Andy Coulson, the former Downing Street director of communications, and Rebekah Brooks, formerly chief executive of News International, stand trial at the Old BaileyPhoto: Getty Images

More than two years have passed since Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson were arrested in connection with the phone-hacking scandal. Since then, more than 60 journalists have been arrested (almost all from the Sun, News of the World and Daily Mirror). Charges are being brought against more than 20 of them, with trials expected to continue into the middle of next year.

The Leveson Inquiry has come and gone. However, the most dramatic action by far starts in 18 days’ time, when Andy Coulson, the former Downing Street director of communications, and Mrs Brooks, formerly chief executive of News International, stand trial at the Old Bailey. They will be joined by Mrs Brooks’s husband, Charlie, and four others, all former News International employees.

The Old Bailey will host the trial of the century. While the Leveson Inquiry generated dramatic headlines, all the most important areas of criminal investigation were out of bounds. The defendants are facing a variety of charges. Mrs Brooks denies conspiracy to intercept voicemail messages, involvement in conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office, and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice (Charlie Brooks, a sports columnist for the Telegraph, is also accused of this offence, for which the maximum penalty is life imprisonment).

Much of the fascination will be human. Hollywood movies are going to be made about Rebekah Brooks, guilty or not guilty, and her journey from the Cheshire village of Daresbury to become the most powerful and courted woman in Britain, intimate of prime ministers and press tycoons alike. Her autobiography, when it comes, will be worth millions.

The trial is of extraordinary political significance. For the past two decades, Rupert Murdoch’s News International was more than just a newspaper group. It became part of the process of government, first under Tony Blair, then Gordon Brown and finally David Cameron.

Mrs Brooks, her husband Charlie and Andy Coulson formed an inner circle, the so-called Chipping Norton set, elements of which David Cameron brought with him into Downing Street.

The trial is certain to distract attention from government, as it tries to get its message out. Instead of the latest economic figures, or falling immigration, night after night the latest drama from the courtroom will dominate the nation’s television screens and social media. The most dangerous problem, however, concerns the unity of the Coalition itself. When Nick Clegg signed up for the Coalition agreement in May 2010 the privileged status of Rupert Murdoch and his newspapers was not part of the bargain. This is a problem for Cameron, not Clegg.

So far, Mr Clegg has not sought to exploit the Prime Minister’s embarrassment. However, as their recent party conference showed, the Liberal Democrats are now in the mood to take on the Conservatives as the general election approaches. The spectacle of the Prime Minister’s personally chosen director of communications, Andy Coulson, and his close country neighbour, Rebekah Brooks, simultaneously on trial at the Old Bailey will be too delicious a target to ignore for many Lib Dems.

Meanwhile, Ed Miliband was the first party leader to express horror at the phone hacking affair, the first to challenge the power of Rupert Murdoch, and the first to call on Rebekah Brooks to quit. This is dream territory for a leader of the opposition. No one in his position has had such a slice of luck since Harold Wilson was handed the Profumo affair exactly 50 years ago. Mr Miliband has assiduously built himself a reputation as a politician who takes on major corporate predators on behalf of their victims. Every day of this trial will make the opposition leader more appealing.

The Prime Minister is therefore finding it hard to resist the temptation to succumb to pressures to bring the media under a new form of control. The details are complicated and very boring, and both Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband would deny it, but the system that both of them are advocating is tantamount to statutory regulation.

This is the system that was meant to be scheduled for discussion at yesterday’s rather mysterious Privy Council meeting. Essentially, the scheme is exactly the same as the one that was agreed six months ago, in Ed Miliband’s office, in the presence of supporters of Hacked Off, the pressure group that is lobbying for restrictions on press freedom.

Their plan to underpin press regulation with legislation is the thin end of a wedge that is hurtling down a very slippery slope across a Rubicon which everyone will in due course regret. The frequently made claim that the statutory element does not matter is nonsense. Once Parliament decides that the media need a new framework of regulation, it is inevitable that some future Parliament will later resolve that the system needs to be toughened. Some pitiable victim of a vicious journalist will be “denied justice” by the new system. MPs will be outraged and action will be taken.

This is a process that can only go one way. No one will ever decide that the system is too strong and the press needs more freedom.

The conduct of many newspapers is frequently disreputable and always has been. There is no getting away from this. Nevertheless, the case for a special regulatory regime does not exist. The best means of dealing with newspaper abuses is through the law of the land.

Paradoxically enough, the way to prove this is through the phone hacking scandal itself. The police were admittedly slow to act. But once the law was brought to bear, scores of journalists were arrested, many of them very senior. Britain’s best-selling Sunday newspaper, The News of the World, was closed down. No system of regulation, however draconian, would have made the slightest difference either way.

Of course people need swift means of redress when they are victims of wrongful or criminal conduct. But that can be provided without the intrusive assault on press freedom now being proposed by all three party leaders.